How To Recover Deleted Or Lost .BMP Files

Digital images come in a variety of formats; there is one format that offers great image quality, the.BMP format. Originally developed by Microsoft, the BMP file format or the Bitmap Image file is often considered over other image file formats for various reasons. For instance, BMP images are device independent and are usually uncompressed, supporting different alpha channels and color depths. Although large image size is one of the downsides of this file format, it is still widely used by photo enthusiasts and editors alike for its ability to retain image data.

But what if you accidentally deleted a BMP file or lost it to data corruption, virus, or any other mishap? Worry not! Whatever the reason might be, here we are going to have a look at some of the possible ways to recover a lost BMP file.

How To Recover Lost .BMP Files?

– Recover Lost BMP Files From Windows Recycle Bin

The first method to recover the BMP file format is to check the Windows Recycle Bin. This method would work only if you didn’t delete the BMP file using the shift+delete operation. Secondly, you act fast because, after a certain period, files get deleted from the Recycle Bin as well.

– Restore Lost BMP File Using a Third Party Photo Recovery Tool

Using a photo recovery tool is a sure-shot way to recover a permanently BMP file. One such tool is Photos Recovery. It is one of the best recovery tools to help you recover deleted photos, videos, and audio files from your computer’s internal hard drives and external storage mediums such as memory cards, USB flash drives, external hard drives, etc.

Since our focus here is to recover deleted BMP files, we’ll also make minimal tweaks in the settings. Here is how you can recover deleted BMP files using Photos Recovery –

1. Download, run and install Photos Recovery.

   

2. From the top-right corner of the interface, click on the hamburger icon and click on Settings, as shown in the screenshot below –
3. In the next Window that occurs, click on Filter Options from the left-hand pane, and on the right-hand side, deselect all the options except the Common Photo Formats under Photo Formats. This is where you can also find the BMP option as well.
4. Click on the blue-colored Apply button from the bottom-right corner of the screen. Don’t worry. You can restorethe settings to default by clicking on the blue-colored Restore
5. Head to the main screen, and select the location from where the BMP file got deleted.
6. Select the mode of scan – The Quick Scan can help you recover files lost because of the shift + delete operation and is quicker. In contrast, the Deep Scan is a little time-consuming but performs a sector-wide scan and can recover BMP files lost due to corruption, virus attack, etc.
7. Click on the Start Scan from the bottom and wait for the process to complete.
8. You can see a list of image files that can be recovered. If you know the BMP image’s file name, you can directly type that in the Search File Name section at the top-right corner just below the quit (X)to find it quickly. Plus, you can even see the File Preview from the right-hand side.
9. Select the file and then click on the Recover button at the interface’s bottom-right corner.
10. Choose a drive location other than the original location from the BMP image file that was lost. This will help prevent the file from being overwritten.

And, there you have it! You have successfully recovered the BMP image file.

– Use a Backup

It is always wise to create regular backups of the data on your computer since mishaps are inevitable. Still, a backup can help restore the data under such circumstances. The same goes for accidentally deleted BMP files or those BMP files that have become corrupt due to OS crashes, virus attacks, or any other reason. You can use backup software to backup your BMP files or create an automatic backup.

– Repair and Restore Corrupt BMP Files

If your BMP file becomes unreadable because of corruption, you can try repair and restore it. For this, we are going to discuss 2 ways. You can use the sfc command or a dedicated repair tool to repair your BMP file.

(i) SFC

1. In the Windows search bar, type cmd.
2. Click on Run as administratorfrom the right-hand side.
3. When the Command Prompt window opens, type SFC /scannow
4. Press Enter.

Now check if you can access the .BMP file. If not, you can use a BMP repair tool. While there are many free and paid tools, you can use Aspose, a free online app for repairing BMP files.

(ii) Repair BMP Online

1. Drag and drop the inaccessible corrupted.BMP file in the area, as shown in the screenshot below.
2. Click on the gree colored Repair Now button from the bottom of the screen.
3. Follow the on-screen instructions and select the file in the file format you want.

Wrapping Up

If you have exhausted all hopes of recovering an accidentally deleted BMP file, give a Photo Recovery tool like Photos Recovery a chance. We hope you can recover .BMP image files using the methods discussed in this post. If yes, share this post with friends who might be going through the same issue. For more such tech-related fun-filled content, keep reading WeTheGeek.

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